


Orphic

by navree



Category: Pundit & Broadcast Journalist RPF (US), Real News RPF
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Catholicism, I'm here to fuck you up, M/M, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, and almost all of this was written at midnight, this is...huh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-21 01:54:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14906222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navree/pseuds/navree
Summary: God, please oh God oh Lord, he'll do anything, become anything, but please please please don't let him care.(adjective.) beyond ordinary understanding.





	Orphic

**Author's Note:**

> My love of rare words + my love of singlehandedly attempting to fill at least a page of a ship tag + my love for writing these two is the reason this exists. That and a certain SOMEONE'S constant attacks via jimjake gifs. Also this has no narrative coherence I don't know what it is  
> as always, comments (either positive or constructive) are always welcome and much appreciated!

* * *

_sough (v.) to moan, to rustle, to sigh;_

_(n.) the gentle, soothing murmur of wind or water_

* * *

 

 

 

 

At some point in his life Jim realized that he liked the sound of the water. It's a nice sound, a quiet and easy going sound that manages to calm him down when nothing else does. D.C. has the Potomac river, which isn't the ocean, but it's water, and sometimes it's windy on the water, and the rustling, sighing murmur drowns out everything in his head. For that he's grateful. 

It's always just a little bit chilly out on the water, and Jim welcomes it. His face feels too flushed sometimes, too heated, and the briskness of the air here **_(_** a sharp contrast to how fucking muggy it is everywhere else in the city **_)_** is refreshing. Cooling.

He comes here sometimes, oftentimes really, when everything becomes too much. Came here with a bottle after his marriage imploded, came here and vomited after one of Trump's pressers, came here and stared at the stars when it became clear they weren't going to be letting him on The Lead any time soon. Not that he needs some heartache infused nightmare scenario to get him down by the water. 

Sometimes he just likes the sound of it. The sound of the wind and the water, the whisper, like someone's lips are brushing at the shell of his ear, telling him something good. 

Jim closes his eyes and breathes in deep, tilting his head back **_(_** he can hear the vertebrae cracking, well Jake does tell him he's too tense **_)_** and letting his mind go quiet. White noise, that's what he needs, that's what he pleads for when confession and whiskey and sex and everything else fail him.

_Help him help him help him help him-_

 

 

 

Jake makes _so much fucking noise_. If it was anyone else it would annoy Jim have to death. His mind is loud enough as it is; does he really need someone else making a variety of different noises to add to the cacophony? But, well, he's Jake fucking Tapper, he's world famous and well respected on both the right and the left and he makes Jim's heart stutter just a little bit unevenly, so he lets it slide. 

Besides, he likes Jake's noises. Jake's voice is pleasant and even and nice to listen to. His laugh is infectious, when it's his actual laugh that he uses when he genuinely finds something funny. And then there are the noises, _the noises_ , that wring themselves from Jake's mouth in bed. The sighs and the moans that make Jim himself whine behind gritted teeth, the ones he thinks about when he's in some foreign hotel room and aching for something the world won't give him and well really this is the next best thing, isn't it? 

Let's not go down that rabbit hole Jim, not tonight. 

Jake is making noise now, a hum of appreciation because the scotch they're drinking at the bar in Jim's hotel, because his place is getting fumigated because God hates him, is actually pretty good. 

It's not Jim's first drink of the day, or even his third drink of the day, but he doesn't feel even a little bit intoxicated. Maybe it's because he's what they call high functioning, where he can keep his job and his relationships and even fool most of the world into thinking he doesn't chase absolution at the bottom of a glass **_(_** oh but he does he does he _does_ and he's yet to find it and it chokes him tears his lungs apart to think of it **_)_** almost daily. 

The two reporters are staring at each other, Jim's eyes hooded, Jake's full of longing even though they're in public, for fuck's sake. The ice in Jim's drink clinks against the glass as he finishes, and he swipes the pad of his thumb across his upper lip. He sees the muscle in Jake's jaw twitch, and Jake's earned it hasn't he, so he _smiles_ at him. It's the most uninhibited he ever lets himself be, when he smiles like that, and he doesn't smile at many people like that. 

Jake's lips part slightly, and Jim downs the other man's drink for him and fishes his room key out of his back pocket, because he's in for another night of Jake making those lovable noises. 

 

 

 

* * *

_dirl (v.) to thrill, to vibrate, to penetrate; to tremble or quiver_

* * *

 

 

 

 

If anyone asks him why he's actually on The Lead today, on the panel no less, on the set for the first time in months, he'll say it's because he knows Jake has a bottle of bourbon stashed in his office and being on the show should entitle him to at least some of it. Of course it's not just that. 

He agreed pathetically quickly when they asked if he wanted to be on the panel to discuss the latest disaster that's plaguing the administration. Yes, yes he wants to be on the panel, of course he does he's missed the studio and he's missed Jake which is idiotic because it's not like he doesn't see Jake and do more than just see Jake but it's nice to feel like he belongs to the network again, like he's _wanted_ , like the correspondence gig wasn't a death sentence, tossing him to be rent apart by the wolves. 

He weaponizes his charm, sharpens his smile, makes a few quips here and there and builds jokes and defenses alike and being back still sends a thrum up his spine. It's thrilling. He feels alive, and for a moment the only thoughts in his head are the ones he wants to be there. 

They're on a commercial break **_(_** there are fewer commercial breaks than there were the last time he was on wow Jake's really gotten popular **_)_** and Jim's checking his phone. Sharon's sent him a picture of the kids. He knows she doesn't do it to be cruel but still...He glances up with thinned lips and catches Jake giving him that look. 

You know the one. Everyone knows the one. 

It's The Look. The one that has the little crease between his brows and the almost puppy dog like eyes and the soft mouth and the _expression_. Christ, the expression. In his head Jim calls it lovelorn, that's the closest one word description for it. It's desire and affection but also pain, heartbreak and longing personified on Jake's face, and more than anything something akin to worship,  worship for him. It's painful to see, this look, because Jake always gives it to him, whether he's able to see it or not, all that need and lust and love laid bare and unmasked. And all for what? Someone who doesn't deserve it, who is unworthy and will remain unworthy?

_Idolatry_ , one of the voices in his head whispers. The deep reverence for something, something empty, and that's just what he is, and what in The Lord's name did he do to earn that look on Jake's face? How can he make it stop? Please God make it stop _it hurts_. 

Jim flashes him his smile, the one he saves for him, the bright one, and when they're on air they crack some jokes and Jake gives him the version of the look that incorporates starry eyes. Jim lets himself light up just a titch, as if they're in private and not in front of a nation, and wonders how much of it is genuine and how much of it is a show. 

He's in Jake's office already making his way through Jake's bourbon when Jake shows up. He wants his mind to shut off. Jake doesn't take the bourbon but he does take Jim's free hand in his and keeps quiet. That's the problem right there? Jim knows he cares, cares too much, but he won't show it. Jake has no such reservations. Of course, because Jake still has things to lose. Jim's lost everything.

Somehow. When the fuck did that happen?

So if he pretends he doesn't care, if he pushes himself far and away from any attempts by Jake to care, then maybe Jake won't either, or at least will believe that Jim doesn't care as much as he does, because there's no way Jake can match it. And Jim doesn't want him to try. He'd rather die than have Jake try. God, please oh God oh Lord, he'll do anything, become anything, but please please please don't let him care. Don't let him try. 

They're quiet for a few moments.

" _And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, o Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, o my God, why hast thou forsaken me?_ " _Psalms 22:1_. Jake's giving him that look again, and Jim knows and thanks Heaven that his face is neutral, unreadable. He thanks Heaven Jake doesn't know what it does to him when he sees that look, how it makes him come apart. 

Jim gives the smile again and either it's blinding or it's ghastly, he doesn't know, he can't see it. He just goes off how other people react to it. React to _him_. Jim Acosta, handsome and bright eyed and dimpled and he shouts questions and gets kicked out of briefings and whored his way through most of the network and he drinks a bit more than he used to and don't you think he knows what they all say about him and it makes him sick it makes him _sick sick sick_ to his stomach.

Either Jake knows all of this or he doesn't, Jim doesn't really care. He keeps himself aloof, the one who doesn't care as much, for a reason. He'll kiss Jake and lock the door to this office, kiss Jake some more and worm his hands into Jake's pants and have Jake work for it, beg for it, make the noises Jake makes and press kisses to Jake's throat and bury his face in Jake's shoulder when they both come with stuttering breath and muffled cries so Jake won't see his face, stripped raw and bared for all in the way he never ever wants it to be outside of a bender or a confessional. 

 

 

 

He staggers into the church, staggers, and when he dips trembling hands into the holy water it flicks onto his suit as well as his skin. He's "sober", not in the way most people would like but he's not hammered or drunk or even buzzed because he just got off work and now he's in a church, searching madly for the nearest confessional and flinging himself into it. He sits in the darkness; he doesn't know if there's even a priest here to take his sins or no. It won't stop him from blathering anyway.

"Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. It has been fourteen days since my last confession." His head pounds as he crosses himself. 

It's the fucking pressers, because there's something about Sarah Huckabee Sanders that's so much worse than Sean Spicer. And something in the way she looked at him today was entirely Trumpian, so eerily reminiscent of the President and the leering, predatory way of _You're a real beauty_. Then, it had made Jim want to gag, crawl out of his skin, cleanse himself in any way known to man to get rid of the filthy feeling, and apparently that hasn't changed at all.

What is he here to confess, he wonders, staring at the lattice work, trying to figure out whether or not someone's listening to him. Well, besides God, but God is always listening. Watching. Watching Jim fly at the sun and melt the wax off his wings every day for the sake of his job, watching Jim douse himself in alcohol, watching Jim shred himself little piece by little piece night after night. Watching him with Jake, watching him debase Jake, ruin Jake. 

No, not in that way. Jim's long outgrown the phase of fearing God's divine wrath for how he chooses to love **_(_** and really he loves Jake that much is certain and that's what so fucking scary and horrible **_)_** ; this is something else. Yes, it was Jake who first came to him, Jake who'd first fallen hard and fast in that way he does, Jake who'd first begged for him, in his bed and other places, and it's Jake who disregarded risk because it's Jake who has a family, not Jim. 

But Jake hadn't fallen for Jim. He'd fallen for the Jim he put out into the world, the shining sunlight beacon Jim, the smiling Jim, the effortless Jim, the one who'll never care more than a fraction and who'll toss casual lines and smirks over the slope of his shoulder. And that is Jim, really, but it's a half of Jim, it's not all of Jim. It's not the Jim in the confessional now, the Jim with the clenched jaw and the convulsions and the desperate need for a drink and the shallow breaths that are dangerously close to hyperventilation, the one searching for the words he needs to talk to his God. 

"I have violated a commandment," is what he settles on at least, because it's true and it's easy to say. But it's also ridiculous, of course he's violated a commandment he's probably been violating commandments for a while now. Shamefully, he laughs, and muffles it behind his hand, except soon he's sobbing. Sobbing and praying and grieving for something, he's not sure what, forcing himself quiet in the shakes of his desperation.

He can't confess, how can he confess to sin when he is sin? 

He loves Jake, and he lets Jake love him, when he shouldn't have, but he can't stop, can't ever stop, he can't stop being with Jake, smiling at him, joking with him, talking to him, fucking him, loving him. He digs his fingers into his hair and weeps. 

Weeps and begs, mouthing broken words in English and Spanish and Latin, prayers both formal and informal, keening heartbreak smothered by palms. _Please forgive me, God forgive me, please God please God oh God please oh Lord forgive me forgive me forgive me I beg you forgive me I'll do anything please God forgive me just forgive me I'm begging I'm begging please God please Jake forgive me God Jake Jake just forgive me forgive me forgive forgive forgive-_

His shattering is kept quiet, muted, until it's over and he's spent and he and The Lord go quiet and coherent. A good Catholic boy. 

It's a whiskey night. 

 

 

 

* * *

_effleurage (v.) “to stroke as one would a flower”_  
_(n.) a series of light stroking touches_

* * *

 

 

 

 

They alternate when to be gentle and when to be rough. Usually it depends on the mood. Sometimes they just need to make something go away. Sometimes they don't want this to ever go away. It's mostly Jake's moods, since Jim's the one actually doing the fucking and he's never going to stop making sure Jake's as comfortable as he can be. 

"I've got you," he'll whisper against Jake's jaw. Always. Not just during sex. In other ways, too, if Jake needs it. He so rarely does, he's got his life annoyingly put together compared to everyone else. 

Jim tells him so, when they're both at some function or another, Jim forgets because he's had two glasses of champagne and champagne tends to make him a bit sleepy. Jake laughs in a short burst, and really it's not that funny but Jim'll toss him a smile anyway. They lapse into a silence, an easy one. Jim rubs his index finger below his bottom lip and Jake's eyes go dark. 

Good. Because he saw the way Jake was eyeing him earlier and better to leave the man turned on and needy rather than ready to spout out something about how he drinks too much now. Jake takes a step forward; Jim cocks an eyebrow. Generally Jake's fonder of him taking the lead on these things. Jim feels a smirk grow at his own pun inside his head. 

He should drink champagne more often if it makes him this tolerable to even himself. 

Jake catches Jim's right hand gently, excruciatingly so, and Jim's heart stops beating. His middle finger is at the center of Jim's palm, and his thumb almost directly above it at the heel of his hand. It feels like it's burning a hole in Jim's skin, you're too much Jake. 

He's reminded of stigmata. The torment of Christ, the wounds of the cross appearing on the devout, a crown of scratches and holes in the feet and bloody hands with bloody wrists. Is he the afflicted, Jake the divine? No, no because Jake's giving him that look again as he strokes his finger delicately over Jim's skin and he looks weak, weak for Jim. Oh and Jim is no god, he's too cruel, too flawed to be a god, not when he loves the way Jake loses himself for him, not when he hates that he loves it, hates that he loves him. 

Jim kisses him, mouth hard and fast and rough on Jake's, and in a public restroom with Jake's wife and all their colleagues right outside. But Jim keeps his hands soft, gentle, like he's holding something delicate, something precious, something fragile. He doesn't want it to break, doesn't want anything to break. But things that fall will break; is that why Jim's been collapsing so much more than usual lately?

When they break apart, Jim smiles, wide and bright and happy. Doesn't he put on a good show? Well it's only half a show now, with Jake. And Jake gives him a similar smile, unfurling something in Jim's chest.

 

 

 

He knows certain things about Jake. Knows where Jake likes to be kissed and touched, knows how Jake likes his coffee, knows just how much Jake loves his dogs, knows a lot about Jake. He also knows that Jake loves it when Jim says his name. 

His full name.

Jake's trying really hard to care. It's because he's getting too close, because he's seeing more than what Jim offers, sees how he soaks himself in alcohol so that when he lights his match he might burn up faster, consumed by the noise in his mind and the pain **_(_** oh God the pain **_)_** that sears through his blood every waking moment. And maybe he's starting to see that the mask of aloofness will only ever be that, a mask. 

That terrifies Jim, because he knows he cares more than Jake ever could, and that he'll destroy Jake if he brings him down to that level. So he distracts, however he can, whenever he can. He's fine. He doesn't drink any more than any other adult trying to deal with this administration, of course he doesn't feel like he's dying over and over every time he lets himself love, someone's gotta be the remote one to counteract Jake's neediness. 

He takes advantage of that neediness, fingers that were delicately stroking at Jake's chin moving to cup his cheek, still moving gently against the skin. It's gentle, so gentle, and while everything else is neutral, his eyes are soft. "Jacob." He breathes it like a prayer. 

Jacob, a Biblical name, patriarch of the Israelites, comes either from the Hebrew root עקב ʿqb meaning "to follow, to be behind" but also "to supplant, circumvent, assail, overreach", or from the word for "heel", עֲקֵב ʿaqeb, a fitting name that he murmurs as he feels his unholiness tint Jake's shine. 

Jake shivers against him, and Jim'll use that, manipulate that, keep their roles firmly in place, and fall apart later, with malt liquor and his eyes screwed shut, alone. The way it's supposed to be, the way he wants it. And that is the way he wants it, it _is_. 

It's only a sin if you lie to God, not to yourself. 

 

 

 

 

* * *

_cafuné (v.) running your fingers through your lover’s hair_

* * *

 

 

 

 

In the softer moments, Jim remembers that he's somewhat obsessed with Jake's hair. He can't help himself, really. It's soft, and easy to card his fingers through at all occasions. Jim takes full advantage of this obsession whenever he can, because goddammit he really fucking loves Jake's hair and all he can do with it.

When they kiss, Jim rucks his fingers through it just so he can muss it up a bit and because it makes Jake's pulse jump and that makes Jim smile against his lips.

When they fuck, Jake's hair is something Jim can hold onto, fingers wound tight and breath coming in short pant and God out of the room.

And after, Jim just plays with it, and grounds himself. Reminds himself to be here, in the present, and to let his mind quiet, or at least let everything except Jake fade into the background. 

Jim feels tired lately. Physically, emotionally, mentally. He's exhausted, with himself and the world and all he keeps at bay and how he keeps it at bay. Having Jaked tucked beside him reminds to be, when he would much rather not. Not everything in his life is fire and brimstone. Sometimes there are touches of angel wings. And sometimes he tries to mimic it, carding his fingers through Jake's hair and forcing himself out of his mind and all it entails. 

He feels Jake tremble against him, and Jake is a relatively private person. Not to Jim's level, but private nonetheless. Being privy to any type of emotional vulnerability is a rare thing. So Jim pulls him closer and passes hands through his hair, gentle and soft and soothing, Jake's face pressed against his shoulder. 

The next time Jim prays, actually intoxicated this time around and tears drying on his cheeks and trying to fight that horrible feeling of wanting to claw his chest open just to rip out his heart and make everything stop, he adds a postscript for Jake. And maybe Jake doesn't believe in what he believes, in all the specifics and the pageantry, but it is ultimately the same God, the same solace, the same refuge, and what can it hurt? 

The next time Jim sees him, in private, in the elevator late one night on the way to his car and Jake no doubt to his, he passes a quick hand through Jake's hair, just as a reassurance, before he begins acting again.  

 

 

 

* * *

_cataglottism (n.) kissing with tongue_

* * *

 

 

 

 

It's been so long, too long. They're both been out of D.C. at separate times, and while yes it's common knowledge at this point that Jake is needy to the point of desperation, even Jim can crack, and he's been aching for days. Funny, isn't it, that Jake's the one who's supposed to to care more, to long more, the one who goes into a spiral whenever Jim's mentioned, and Jim is the one keeping himself five feet apart emotionally.

Certainly not physically, he always seems latched to Jake whenever they're close to each other. And of course Jim knows he's a liar, even if he might be the only one who knows. Doesn't mean he'll stop lying. 

His mind is divided into three even parts **_(_** the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit **_)_**.

The overwhelming majority is focused on kissing Jake, because it's been ages and he's missed him. Pathetic, right? Their bodies are perfectly slotted against each other and Jim's hands are in Jake's hair, stroking it back and pushing through it and tugging him closer, unable to decide what he wants to do. Jake's hands are scrabbling at his shoulders, pulling at the material of his dress shirt **_(_** he discarded his suit jacket long ago and his tie is unknotted as if in contrast to Jake's stark professionalism in the dark **_)_** wanting him closer and making _those noises_. Their lips move against each other, familiar and exploring all at the same time. They missed each other. 

Jim tastes mint toothpaste and tea in his mouth, and he wonders what Jake tastes in his. No alcohol, not tonight, not whiskey or scotch or bourbon or wine red or white or champagne or even fucking beer. He'll make up for it tomorrow, of course, and feel nothing, because he's high functioning as they say, but tonight he's crystal clear and kissing Jake and remembering what it feels like to be at home.

They're on the water, by the Potomac, and yes it's always chilly there but this makes him feel warm and wanted and maybe everything'll be OK, just this once. 

But there are two other parts of his mind. The second part is the one that makes him focused on keeping cool and detached, smirks and smiles and cocked eyebrows and being the one in control. Jim Acosta, beautiful and eclectic and sarcastic and flirtatious and desirable and desirous and on the right side of sanity. The third part of his mind is the on opposite, is on the fact that his ruination has catapulted him into Jeff Zucker's office upon the big man's request tomorrow and he knows, _he knows_ , what's coming. He'll take it, graciously, bow his head and let them place the thorny crown on his brow and if his eyes shine that's all they'll do until he's alone. 

Maybe that's why he's kissing Jake like this, so thoroughly, so intensely, so completely, without even a thought of how and when to take him to back to his place, take him to bed, even though that's the inevitable outcome. Because tomorrow he'll have slipped through the cracks, bloodied and broken and mangled by constant attacks and constant guilt and constant trying and and constant dying and constantly just...constantly being. Maybe Jeff Zucker will be right to nail his hands to this and let him expire on this cross of his own making. 

Again, Jim feels ripped apart, in agony, tortured, and again he thinks of Christ. _“It is finished!” Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. John 19:30._ No, no it's not, he won't let it. For the first time, a spark of resistance, a flare, deep in his chest, in that part that's mostly numb save for the few moments he lets himself be defenseless.

Not this. Maybe everything else, but not this, not Jake, never Jake. Finish everything else, yes, give up his spirit along with everything else, yes, but not Jake. He doesn't want to. He's not Christ, he'll love like he's dying but he doesn't love to die, not yet, not now. And maybe that's why he has hellfire rained upon on him, scorching down his throat, singing his skin, setting his entire life aflame. He won't render himself up to God with a cry of surrender and a hope at peace.

He never repents. 


End file.
